With the change in tone of Eric Boullier and Zak Brown with respect to Honda, rumours are strong on McLaren going to Mercedes engines next year and leaving Honda to sort themselves out running in the back of Sauber.

Lewis Hamilton was pretty choked up when he was given that helmet. Apparently although the announcer said it was an original, what they handed him there was a replica (Hamilton actually commented later "It's a freshie"). They are shipping the original direct to Hamilton's house because it's worth too much to have it kicking around at a circuit.

In the 8th race of the F1 season, Fernando Alonso scored the first points that McLaren-Honda have earned all year. This was also the first race that both McLaren-Honda cars were running at the finish. The team racked up 10 DNFs for two cars in the first seven races.

Consider that Valtteri Bottas started on the front row, then bounced off the inside curb and crashed into Kimi Raikkonen on the first lap and found himself in last place, a lap down, after he pitted to replace the damaged nose of his Mercedes. The safety car periods helped him get his lap back as he stormed back up through the field. Lewis Hamilton was annoyed that Bottas wasn't slowing down to block Vettel for him instead of cutting a second a lap off of Lance Stroll's time to take second place away from the young Canadian just as they crossed the finish line.

Lewis Hamilton was annoyed that Bottas wasn't slowing down to block Vettel for him instead of cutting a second a lap off of Lance Stroll's time to take second place away from the young Canadian just as they crossed the finish line.

Crybaby much?

The Model M is not for the faint of heart. You either like them or hate them.

No mention of Vettel's red mist incident? At first glance, it did look like a brake check, until they showed a replay of Hamilton's onboard which showed him gradually and cleanly slowing down even from before corner entry.

More than the penalty, Vettel's probably learning a better lesson from his lost podium/victory - if he hadn't reacted the way he did, he'd have been the race winner (he might have got a 5s or 10s penalty just for running into Hamilton). Instead, he lucked out with Hamilton behind him due to a freak issue with Hamilton's headrest.

How do you calculate that? So they need to lap people a few times to be back in the top 20?

Until 2015, the rules were that once your car reached the last spot on the grid, the remaining grid drops were converted to an in-race timed penalty. However, even back then, the woeful Honda engines meant that after starting at the back of the grid with an underpowered car, the McLaren team then had to hit the pitlane to serve out the time penalty, to the point it got embarrassing. So in 2015 (around the Canadian GP, I think) they withdrew that rule.

Now, once the grid drops take you to the back of the field, any further grid drop penalties are just discarded - so if they qualify 15th and have a 40-place grid drop, they drop 5 places to 20th (last), and the remaining 35 are ignored. So, anytime someone is hit with a 15-spot penalty for a new component, there's probably a good case to be made for changing out more components because the added penalty doesn't actually hurt much (though Vettel might beg to differ once he comes upon his inevitable engine penalties later this season).

JustAnEngineer wrote:

Lewis Hamilton was annoyed that Bottas wasn't slowing down to block Vettel for him instead of cutting a second a lap off of Lance Stroll's time to take second place away from the young Canadian just as they crossed the finish line.

I did find it very interesting the way Hamilton asked his race engineer Bono for Bottas's help in pincering Vettel. That said, the team's response was clear, and it did pay off with a last-gasp overtake. Good of FOM to have broadcast that snippet.

Hamilton did brake-check in front of Vettel. That was Hamilton playing to the limit of the rules to get any advantage that he could. If Mr. Vettel is one of the most skilled racing drivers in the world, he should be skilled enough to avoid a collision even when his competitor pulls a stunt like that.

Hamilton did brake-check in front of Vettel. That was Hamilton playing to the limit of the rules to get any advantage that he could. If Mr. Vettel is one of the most skilled racing drivers in the world, he should be skilled enough to avoid a collision even when his competitor pulls a stunt like that.

No, he didn't. Vettel was simply too close and anticipated Lewis accelerating out of the corner as he had done at the end of the previous safety car. However Lewis had got dangerously close to overtaking the safety car before the line last time, so was leaving more of a gap this time around. Still, Vettel should know better than to be caught out like that, never mind the petulant ramming afterwards. I'm amazed he got away with such a light penalty.

Strangely the incident has echoes of a similar Vettel mistake 10 years ago, though on that occasion Lewis was probably somewhat more culpable.

Lewis Hamilton was pretty choked up when he was given that helmet. Apparently although the announcer said it was an original, what they handed him there was a replica (Hamilton actually commented later "It's a freshie"). They are shipping the original direct to Hamilton's house because it's worth too much to have it kicking around at a circuit.

Ah, ok. I was like, WTF is he doing, when he just placed the helmet on the roof of the car, even unguarded for a moment.

Red Bull will probably get it together once Renault gets their sh@t together and gives them a more powerful and reliable engine.As can be seen the problem aint their drivers or the aero package so Renault is all that's left.At least this year Renault seem to be getting their act together at long last.Unlike Honda!!!

Good to see Bottas win, shame he refused the shoey Will be interesting to see this race to see if Honda has improved with its new updates, Alonso crashing out made it difficult to know if the McLaren would've gone the distance and/or gone faster.Hope Silverstone's a more entertaining race.

I'm also thinking that Kubica replacing Palmer next year is likely. The first "test" was more meant to be a be nice to him and let him have a drive in an F1 car, but he was instantly quick and ended up setting a faster time than Sirotkin had previously. This caused them to give him the proper test at Paul Ricard. Haven't heard any timings yet...

Hey End User, whilst I agree with notfred it is a bit of fun, but as he said its a joke which has gone on a bit long. That being said being a native of the same state that he comes from, he doesn't play mind games off track, that isn't in his make up. Now if the shoey was done before the races I'd agree with you that mind games were afoot (groan).West Aussies work hard and when we're not working, relax with laughs even at our own expense. The shoey is just a means to show the human side of the racers when not racing, have a laugh and even give the audience a laugh for those who bravely give the shoey a go, and show the screwed up look when they taste champagne combined with hot smelly shoe Even though Bottas refused it he was smiling, so everyone could see he knew it was purely for laughs, no mind games there.